


Pulling Heaven Down

by Callisto



Category: Supernatural
Genre: First Kiss, M/M, Season/Series 02, Sharing a Bed
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-04-05
Updated: 2011-04-05
Packaged: 2017-10-17 15:33:00
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,003
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/178328
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Callisto/pseuds/Callisto
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Looking closer, all Dean could see of his eyes was a kind of bruised darkness, and Sam was currently using them <i>and</i> his jaw to look back at Dean with a combination of <i>puppy about to be kicked</i> and <i>fuck you I’m doing this</i>. Which was uniquely Sam, and which had been getting under Dean’s skin since the first milk bottle had been hurled out the crib at him.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Pulling Heaven Down

**Author's Note:**

> My first attempt at Sam/Dean, this was beta'd by Izzie and Mara. It's set loosely in S2 when Jared Padalecki broke his wrist and put Sam Winchester in a cast for a good chunk of episodes.

_I may be some sort of crazy  
We may be some sort of crazy,  
But I swear on everything I have and more,  
You make the sound of pulling heaven down.  
-'Sound of Pulling Heaven Down’, Blue October-_

The pressure on his chest should have woken him, but it didn’t. That honor belonged to the asshole next door dropping a bottle and cursing when it shattered outside his room. Dean lay in the dark listening to the guy spit, growl, and then fumble around with keys and a lock he was clearly in no state to navigate. Dean sighed. Fucking hicks. He hated Iowa with an unholy passion at times.

He raised his head a little and squinted down the bed. Once upon a time, his dad had pressed a hunting knife into his small hands and told him to get used to sleeping with the heft and weight of it on his sternum. Later he’d been trained to do the same with a rock salt gun, and later still with a loaded pistol and even a bag of salt. Now, instead of weapons he had Sam’s arm and cast rising and falling steadily on his solar plexus. He smiled. The weight and safety of it was so familiar he knew it would never wake him.

In truth, the cast on Sam’s right arm was not proving to be nearly the pain in the ass Dean had predicted. Hell, he’d stopped even noticing it as soon as Sam had quit bitching about it. Yet here it was, taking his attention again and making him think of zombies, broken headstones, and a brother who approached both with his usual ratio of one ounce of coordination to one ton of determination.

As if on cue, the head on the pillow next to his muttered something indistinct and the cast dragged down a little more, rubbing across the cotton of Dean’s T-shirt before settling again. Sam’s fingers were now suspended in mid-air over Dean’s left side, the cast now fully across his midriff.

 _The mighty Dean Winchester. Feared hunter by day, comfort cushion by night. Jesus._

When they slept side by side like this these days, they didn’t touch often. And if they did, this tended to be the pattern. Dean on his back (an old, old habit ingrained by John), and Sam lying parallel on his stomach a few inches away. At some point in the proceedings, Sam would turn his head away from Dean, stretch out the cast behind him, and burrow his face so completely into his pillow that Dean had actually pinched him once to check he was still breathing. The kick in the shins he’d gotten for his pains had seemed proof enough at the time, and he’d left him to it after that. It looked uncomfortable as hell, but on a scale of one to ten of things worth thinking about in the dark? It was easily minus twenty.

******

The first time Sam pushed the two beds together was in Boise, Idaho. Dean came out of the shower one night after an unspectacular hunt to find Sam huffing and heaving with his feet and one good arm to get one bed pushed up against the other. Thoroughly entertained, Dean leaned on the doorjamb drinking juice straight from the carton.

“A little to the left, Martha.”

“Bite”... _shove_...“me”... _kick_.

Sam hadn’t done something like this since he was eight and Dean had come home to find him whimpering at the movie _Halloween_ from behind a cushion. It didn’t matter that Sam was already learning about all kinds of things going bump in the night; the sight of little Michael Myers standing there with blood dripping down a large knife had apparently crossed some terrible freak-out line for him.

After much head-shaking and due mocking, Dean had whacked him across the shoulders with a rolled up car magazine and yanked the cushion away. Then he’d sat down, hauled Sam over to his side of the sofa, and made light of every single jump and scare that came on the screen from that point on.

Proud of his big-brother prowess—Sam had been _giggling_ by the end of the movie—Dean had nevertheless woken that night to the sounds of a camp bed being unfolded excruciatingly slowly right up close to his own small bed. He’d sighed heavily and rolled over to lay a hand down to pat Sam clumsily on the head. He’d put up with those damn squeaks and a nightlight for nearly a month.

He was about to open his mouth and ask Sam if this was Michael Myers all over again, but the look on his brother’s face killed the joke. Something was off. The hunt had been nothing but a weak-ass poltergeist, all run out of energy and reduced to little more than knocking cups off a shelf. Yet here was Sam, hunched into his pockets as if something he had a grip on in there was the only thing holding him up, and looking like a good strong breeze might just ruin that plan anyway. He was also clenching his jaw so tightly it had to hurt, and his eyes were barely visible through heavy, unwashed bangs. Looking closer, all Dean could see of his eyes was a kind of bruised darkness, and Sam was currently using them _and_ his jaw to look back at Dean with a combination of _puppy about to be kicked_ and _fuck you I’m doing this_. Which was uniquely Sam, and which had been getting under Dean’s skin since the first milk bottle had been hurled out the crib at him.

Sam coughed and gestured vaguely with his cast. “I just thought... I mean... the TV—“

“Whatever, man. It’s cool. Just don’t yell when I forget and step on you in the night.” A tentative smile, a tight nod, and Sam’s clear relief that he wasn’t going to get teased for this did something to Dean’s throat. So he cleared it. “And you look like a fucking yeti, by the way. So go shower, get it all shiny, and tomorrow we’ll pick out ribbons so you can do braids.”

The flipped finger and arm-punch Sam gave him on his way to the bathroom did something to restore faith in his prowess as the older one again. And besides, Sam was due the occasional boogeyman. Dad was dead and gone the Devil knew where, the shining was twisting his brother from the inside out at times, and all the reassurances in Dean’s arsenal could not hide the fact that neither of them knew exactly what any of this yellow-eyed-demon shit really meant.

Then there was the fact that Detective Sheridan had arrested Dean and nearly executed him in front of Sam not two days before. And there was always Ava, of course. Pain-in-the-ass Ava, who was still missing and who Sam was being so very, very _Sam_ about that Dean didn’t know whether to get dewy-eyed over the pathetic faith his brother had, or kick the guilt complex right out of him.

The sound of the hot water clanking up through the pipes echoed around the room as Sam’s shower started up. Dean looked from the closed bathroom door back to the beds. He scrubbed a hand over his face and let out a long breath. This he could do. Yeah, this much he could do and keep quiet about.

********

So the pattern began. Occasional the first week, and then whenever the furniture allowed it. And one night when it didn’t, Dean emerged from the bathroom to find the long line of Sam’s back pressed along the wall Dean’s own bed was against. He was fast asleep with his cast tucked tightly under his chin at a weird angle.

A long, long pause ensued.

True, the bed was just about two pillows wide and Sam had at least hauled over the ones from his own bed as extras. But Sam wasn’t eight, this was no childish nightmare, and Dean had enough trouble sharing his sleeping space with clingy waitresses, never mind with his Sasquatch-tall and occasionally handsy brother.

Dean’s eyes narrowed. _Fuck. Not fair. Not fair at all_. He was tired and in no mood for Sam being a self-centered princess. He’d been driving for hours along some pretty crappy roads that day and had only just steamed the kinks out of his shoulders under the shower. Now he wanted nothing more than a few solid hours of sleep under his belt before the hunt got under way. So no, nuh-uh. Beds together was one thing, but this was getting fuckin’ ridiculous and Sam could just...

An odd little hitch of distress from Sam, his brow creasing as his eyes moved quickly under closed lids. A snuffle, a cheek rub into the pillow, and the moment passed. As did Dean’s hand, over the foot he’d been about to shake none too gently.

Dean stayed where he was a while longer, eyes fixed on the odd rise and fall of Sam’s cast. Then he moved up to the small table lamp near the head of the bed and switched it off. Lifting the covers, he slowly eased himself in. Sam didn’t move but Dean could swear the breathing on his left got deeper after he’d settled on his back and closed his eyes.

 _Fuck. Not fair. Not fair at all, Sammy._

*******

And that was that. Weapons, duffels, take-out, the next day’s clothes, laundry, maps, print outs...all started going on one bed while the two of them stretched out on the other. Dean still wasn’t sure how right it all was, but the harder he tried to find it weird, the better he slept and the dimmer the circles got around Sam’s eyes. And for once Sam was not doing his usual and demanding they get all deep and awkward about any of it over breakfast. Besides, plenty of other things were more than happy to take Dean’s attention and energy away from the issue of how and where he slept at night. Like a coven of suburban housewives who quite literally took a shine to Sam, wanting to cage him and rub his skin before each spell. And a vampire nest led by a teenage metal freak called Van, who Dean almost empathized with before he finally took the head cleanly off Van’s tattoo-covered torso. In light of what passed for day-to-day in their lives, a sleeping arrangement which had them rested and alert to take it all on had very little choice but to slip into the background.

And it was getting to be a background Dean could explain to his conscience or Sam, if either ever called him on it. For one thing, when Sam had his nightmares now it was a lot easier and less sleep-wrecking to just reach out, squeeze an arm and mumble something reassuring. In fact, the second time Dean wasn’t even sure he’d been awake for it until Sam had yawned over waffles the following morning and thanked him for cutting it off.

And for another, Dean just...fuck, he _liked_ it. He liked that he could leave some of the weapons out if he wanted to, he liked that he dragged the TV to one spot and left it there for the duration, and he liked that his brother was sunnier in the mornings and less morose at the end of the day. Dean was opening his eyes to fresh coffee and _a smile_ most mornings now, so any world giving him that treat was fine by him. And not that Dean understood it, but Sam, God love him, never looked anything less than privileged to lie down night after night next to his brother. As if Dean were doing him the biggest favor in the world. For Dean’s part, there was actually a lot to be said for lying in the dark listening to his dorky brother tell him one of the dumbest jokes he’d ever heard—voices an’ all—from a pillow away. All the while trying not to laugh too hard because the ten stitches Sam had just sewed into the skin above Dean’s hip bone pulled if he did, and the sonovabitch probably knew that and was doing all those frickin’ voices on purpose...

That night Dean slept with a slight fever from the stitches, and Sam’s hand curled around his shoulder.

******

The following day he went out and found a waitress, a pretty little thing called Lana maybe, who said “y’all” a lot, gave Dean free pie, and who clearly wanted to show him her tongue piercings up close and personal. He took her out to the alley behind the bar because he was so hard it hurt—she’d practically been on his lap by the third beer, grinding down and giggling into his ear—and because a tiny part of him he wasn’t really interested in hearing from out loud needed to know if the easy lays he’d built his life on might feel different now. And if Sam would get pissy about them.

It was no on both counts.

“Dude, brush your teeth before you even think of climbing in here.”

Dean blinked, still a little sex-loose and beery, despite the walk back through the cold night air. Her piercings had been awesome, and she’d clearly had plenty of practice making the best of them. He looked at Sam, head back down on the pillow and yawning into it. Then he looked at the other bed. _His_ bed. He blinked again. Or was it Sam’s bed? Shit, whatever. He could move all that stuff. He didn’t have to sleep next to his brother, he didn’t have to brush the sex off his teeth because Sam told him to, and he sure as shit didn’t have to stand there swaying like an indecisive moron...

“Dean. _Move_. ’S cold in here,” whined Sam. He turned onto his right side, shifted back and lifted the corner of the blanket. All without opening his eyes.

Dean heeled off his boots and slowly shucked his way out of everything except his T-shirt and boxers. Fuck it. He was too tired to think about this crap. He eased in and couldn’t help a sigh of pure comfort when his back hit the warmth of soft sheets. Was that what this really was then? Just comfort? The tail end of his beer buzz was wearing off, leaving him gazing at the ceiling, inexplicably saddened, relieved, and damp-eyed at the thought. Sam picked that very moment to wriggle forward and nudge Dean’s left shoulder with his nose and chin and Dean couldn’t help but look. _Like a goddamn terrier_. He bit his lip to keep a chuckle from escaping.

Sam wrinkled his nose, eyes still shut. “Smell like an ashtray,” he mumbled, backing off and taking most of the covers with him.

Dean took them back and closed his eyes, smiling.

This kind of comfort he could live with.

******

And for a while it was, and he did. But then halfway across Iowa, while he was listening to a sweet girl called Mona tell him about her cheerleading, he found himself checking his watch and wondering if Sam was asleep yet back at the motel. She stuck her tongue in his ear, he closed his eyes...and saw Sam stealing the good pillow. When her hand unbuttoned his fly and reached in, he heard Sam tell him goodnight, saw his brother lift the covers up for him. At that point he opened his eyes, kissed her hard, and willed himself back to the here and now of her bra hook and the condom in his back pocket.

That night he did something he hadn’t done since the whole sleeping-with-his-brother thing started. He stayed away the whole night. He told himself it was because he was too drunk to walk back, because Mona’s place was nice (it was), and because it was good to sleep curled around the warm curves of a girl again (it wasn’t–she jolted his skin awake and _pushed_ at him in a way Sam never did).

He slept for shit and met Sam at the diner for breakfast the following morning. One look at the tense set of Sam’s shoulders, the dark circles under his eyes, and Dean knew it had been mutual. A grunt of acknowledgement, and then neither spoke except to snipe over the syrup and bitch about the service. Halfway through his second coffee, Dean wanted to reach across the table, grab his brother’s wrist, and ask him if he knew where the fuck all of this was going. And if he did, could he please tell his big brother—pretty, pretty please—before his big brother lost his mind?

That was two days ago.

Which brought Dean back to the way things were apparently meant to be in his life; lying awake at night in a crappy motel and holding up Sam’s arm with his chest because of drunk assholes in Iowa. He listened to Sam breathe a while, until a noise at the window took his attention. Rain had started up in earnest during the last ten minutes or so and was now pattering a steady rhythm down the glass to his left. He could see the trails clearly through the thin curtains, lit silver by the moonlight, and he settled his gaze there and felt strangely at peace. A flash of jasmine scented blonde hair and rain on a bright kitchen window surprised him, sharp and unbidden. Then the smell of something warm... bread, maybe? He shut his eyes and tried to hold on, knowing it to be a sliver of something happy and good from the home he’d known so briefly all those years before. These elusive fragments of memory still caught him unaware sometimes, though less and less frequently as the years passed. On instinct, he turned to look at the home he did have. The one now breathing warmly on his shoulder; the one so very, very much more than rain on a window.

“Sam,” he said reflexively, not really meant to wake. He turned on his side to face his brother, careful as the cast slid off and away. Sam pulled the cast in to his own chest and moved back a little, still asleep. Then he settled on his side facing Dean and continued breathing so evenly and deeply that his breath almost reached Dean’s face. Dean took himself forward until it did.

“Sam,” he said again, a whisper this time. The moonlight was taking all the angles out of Sam’s face and damn if Sam didn’t look _beautiful_. Not a word Dean had thought or used much in his life for the people in it, let alone for his own brother, but then he’d never had him in quite this context before.

It would be the easiest thing right now to bring his left hand up, open his fingers, and lay them on the side of Sam’s face, feel if his skin there was as smooth and cool as it looked in the silver light. At the last second he stopped himself and laid his hand flat on the small space of bed still between them.

He wondered if and when he was going to freak out.

Passes from guys were things he lived with – and he was sure Sam did too. Sam even made veiled comments from time to time about a guy called Stevie from his days in California. And as far as Dean knew, Stevie was one of the very few from those days still on Sam’s speed dial. Whatever that might mean. Neither he nor his brother had hit the ugly tree or any of its branches, and Dean had learned at an early age that when that went with confidence and swagger, you got attention from all sides. Once or twice he’d welcomed the attention, though his attitude had been more of a _fuck you if you think you’re gonna freak me out_ than anything remotely resembling a preference. But this was _Sam_ he was thinking about. And Sam may have been the one to start and persist with all of this sleeping-side-by-side shit, but that in no way meant they were on the same page—or even reading the same fucking book for that matter.

INCEST.

He tried it out, said the word aloud in his head, saw it in huge capital letters, and waited for the shock. Tried to force it when his pulse refused to cooperate.

Nope. His heart was still fairly steady and Sam was still there, right up close and breathing on him.

So he wrapped the word in neon, added a few exclamation marks and saw it again, eyes on Sam the whole time:

INCEST!!!!

This time, a flicker of unease in his gut did uncoil, making him want to pull away, maybe wake Sam up and kick him out to the other bed before either of them did something monumentally stupid.

But weeks of Sam next to him must have taken the edge off all the outrage he was supposed to feel, because when Sam chose that moment to wrinkle his nose and ease back, wincing as his cast pulled, a rush of fondness surged and Dean knew the briefest _what the hell_ before he leaned forward that extra inch and kissed him.

It was soft and not much, and in the back of his mind he waited for the wrath of the universe to assert itself because now, oh yes, now his heart and pulse were doing things to the speed of his blood. And if Sam didn’t open his eyes it meant that not only had he kissed his goddamn brother, but that he’d kissed him while he was fucking _sleeping_ , which was undoubtedly some sort of crazy—

“Dean?” Sam sounded hoarse.

Dean swallowed and laid his palm on Sam’s cheek, still wondering what Sam and the universe might do about any of this when they finally got their act together and opened their eyes.

“No, the abominable snowman, you dick,” said Dean, relaxing a fraction. He may have kissed him but Sam was still going to get the usual for dumb remarks.

Sam blinked his eyes open. Dean held his breath.

“You kissed me.” His face was unreadable. Beautiful still, but unreadable.

Something was telling Dean to move his hand now, to not get caught like this by his brother, the one person he would never be able to hide from if this all went to hell in a handbasket. But god damm it, he was Dean Winchester. In all things. So he kept his hand where it was, resting lightly on Sam’s cheek, even adding a thumb stroke across Sam’s cheekbone.

Sam closed his eyes at that and Dean’s heart froze while his fingers itched to leave. But then Sam— _Sam_ —turned his face into Dean’s hand and just smiled, kissed him oh-so-slowly, and Dean didn’t know whether to hit the little fucker for just putting him through that, or wonder how the simple touch of Sam’s lips on his callused palm made him want to cry. _Jesus fucking Christ_.

“You kissed me,” Sam said again, this time with his eyes open. He brought his left hand up to wrap around Dean’s wrist and keep it there.

“Well, you are in my bed, dude.” If he whispered, he could keep his voice steady.

“No, I’m not.”

“Sammy, what the-”

“You’re in _mine_. Always have been.”

And this time Sam’s smile was blinding.

Sam came forward then, grabbing Dean’s face with both hands as best he could and laughing the word _jerk_ into Dean’s mouth before he could even think about going anywhere. Dean closed his eyes, breathed his brother in, and took a moment to tell the universe to go fuck itself before giving Sam the usual one-word response right back at him.

******


End file.
